Thursday, 25 June 2015

Word of the Day: Defeating Discouragement

Defeating
Discouragement

There is
a weapon the enemy use to rob many people o the blessings and promotion; there
is an expensive tool in the hands of the enemy that can make their attack
effective; there is a strategy the enemy uses when it is like they have run out
of idea. A lot of people would have been in the promise land if they could just
defeat this power; a lot would have made progress if and only if they can wage
war against this power and defeat it; Defeating the power of
discouragement.

Defeating Discouragement

"But
it came to pass, that when Sanballat heard that we builded the wall, he was
wroth, and took great indignation, and mocked the Jews. And he spake before his
brethren and the army of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will
they fortify themselves? will they sacrifice? will they make an end in a day?
will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned?
Now Tobiah the Ammonite was by him, and he said, Even that which they build, if
a fox go up, he shall even break down their stone wall. Hear, O our God; for we
are despised: and turn their reproach upon their own head, and give them for a
prey in the land of captivity:" {Neh 4:1-4}

"So
neither I, nor my brethren, nor my servants, nor the men of the guard which
followed me, none of us put off our clothes, saving that everyone put them off
for washing." {Neh 4:23}

Are you
familiar with Murphy’s Law? The original “Murphy”
was an engineer who conducted an experiment to test human acceleration
tolerances. Unfortunately for him, he installed 16 motion sensors the wrong
way, leading to the now famous quotation, “If anything can go wrong, it will.” I guess the corollary is
also true: “If anything can’t
go wrong, it will anyway.”

As we
come to Nehemiah 4, everything seems to be going wrong all at once. In
chapter one we looked at how Nehemiah prayed, in chapter two we saw how God
moved him from the prosperity of Persia to the desolation of Jerusalem. Last
week, we were introduced to the wall workers and discovered that in kingdom
work, no one can do everything, but everyone can do something. And, because
some worked harder, and Baruch worked with more zeal than anyone else, the
construction project was really zipping along.

But when
we come to chapter 4, things start to get more complicated for Nehemiah. Mr.
Murphy shows up and reminds Nehemiah that when everything seems to be
going well, you’ve obviously overlooked something.

Illustration Story

That
reminds me of a situation that took place several years ago in Darlington,
Maryland. Edith, a mother of eight, came home one Saturday afternoon from her
neighbor’s house, only to discover five of her youngest children huddled
together in the living room intensely concentrating on something. As she slipped
in behind them to see what they were doing, she couldn’t believe her eyes.
Smack dab in the middle of her kids were several baby skunks. She screamed at
the top of her voice, “Children, run!” So each kid grabbed
a skunk and ran to their bedroom!

If anything can go wrong, it certainly will!

Did you
know that there is a plague sweeping the country today? It’s not the Beijing
flu, or cancer, or even the common cold. This outbreak, however, can be just as
deadly as the most dreaded disease known to man ­ it’s called the epidemic of discouragement.

There are factors that makes it such a potent problem.

üIt’s universal.

üNone of us are immune to discouragement.

üEveryone you have ever known has been discouraged at one time or
another.

üIt’s recurring.

üBeing discouraged once does not give you immunity to the
disease. You can be discouraged over and over again. In fact, you can even be
discouraged by the fact that you are discouraged a lot.

üIt’s highly contagious.

üDiscouragement spreads by even casual contact. People can become
disheartened because you are discouraged. You can be bummed out because other
people are discouraged.

External Causes of
Discouragement

There are two main types of discouragement ­ one set of problems come at us from the outside, the other
set attacks us on the inside. Let’s look first at
the external causes.

vThe wall workers were initially excited. They began the work
with great anticipation and joy. It says of them in verse 6 that the “people
worked with all their heart.” Things were going well, the people were
excited, and the wall was going up. Then something happened.

vGetting the work started on the wall was a major achievement,
but keeping the workers working proved to be a much tougher assignment. Someone
has said that exhilaration is that feeling you get just after a great idea hits
you and right before you realize what’s wrong with it.

Where God
is at work, the enemy is also at work. Rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem was
certainly no exception to this. When people take kingdom priorities seriously,
Satan stirs up agitators to block the work of God. These enemies used two types
of external forces.

1.The first one was
ridicule.We see this in verses 1-2: “When Sanballat heard that we were
rebuilding the wall, he became angry and was greatly incensed. He ridiculed the
Jews…”

This is
the third time in the book that we come across Sanballat, who was Nehemiah’s
stiffest opposition. Every time we read about him he is standing against the
work of God, rejecting and ridiculing everything that Nehemiah is trying to
accomplish. Someone has said that ridicule is the “language of the devil.”
Those who can stand bravely when shot at will collapse when they are laughed
at. The enemy often insults the servants of God. Goliath ridiculed David when
the shepherd boy met the giant with only a sling in his hand (1 Samuel
17:41-47). The soldiers mocked Jesus during his trial and the crowd taunted Him
while he was hanging on the cross (Luke 22:63-65, 23:35-37).

Sanballat
and his cronies had begun to ridicule the workers even before the work started
in 2:19: “…they mocked and ridiculed us.” Here in chapter 4, he is making a speech
before the army of Samaria, intensifying the power of ridicule.

Notice
that he called the workers “feeble.”
That word means “withered and miserable.” Next he ridiculed the job they were
doing by asking four taunting questions: “Will they restore their wall?” That
must have made the Samaritan army break out into laughter. How could a remnant
of feeble Jews hope to build a wall strong enough to protect the city from a
mighty army? “Will they offer sacrifices?” Sanballat is saying that it will
take more than prayer and worship to rebuild the city. “Will they finish in a day?”
suggests that the workers had no idea how difficult the task was and would soon
stop what they were doing. “Can they bring these stones back to life?”
indicates that their building materials were so old and damaged that they
couldn’t possibly be used to make a strong wall.

In verse
3, it was Tobias’s turn to ridicule the workers when he tried out a joke on
them, “What they are building ­ if even a fox climbed up on it, he would break
down their wall of stones!” Archeological excavations on these walls revealed
that they were nine foot thick ­ they would need more than a small fox to knock
them down. The workers became the punch line of every joke, and everyone got a
laugh at their expense. Tobiah hoped that his sarcasm would make the builders
cast an apprehensive glance at their hard work and activate within them an
avalanche of discouragement.

Friends, whenever you attempt to get
involved in the work of God, you will always face ridicule. Expect it and don’t
stop working.

2.The second cause was
repression:In verses 7-8. The enemies have moved from being bothered by
the Jews to being very angry. They all plotted together to come and fight
against Jerusalem and stir up trouble against it. Warren Wiersbe writes, “God’s
people sometimes have difficulty working together, but the people of the world
have no problem uniting in opposition to the work of the Lord.”

The
references in verse 7 are to the four points of the compass, Sanballat and the
Samaritans on the north, Ashdod on the west, Tobiah and the Ammonites on the
east, and Geshem and the Arabs to the south. The workers were surrounded and
lived in constant fear of being ambushed.

Internal Causes of
Discouragement

Pressures
from without often create problems within. Opposition outside the ranks can
lead to depression on the inside. It wasn’t the voice of the enemy that was the
most pervasive; it was the voice of God’s own people. And, just like today,
it’s so easy to internalize the words of the enemy and feel like giving up.

Notice
the first part of verse 10: “Meanwhile the people in Judah said…” Discouragement
started first within the royal tribe of Judah. They had David’s blood in their
veins and you would think they would have had more faith and courage than the
rest of the people. They were looked upon as leaders and pacesetters. If the
tribe of Judah was bummed out, then the other tribes would be more inclined to
give up the project as well.

1.The first cause of
internal discouragement was fatigue. Verse
10 reads, “Meanwhile, the people in Judah said, ‘The strength of the laborers is
giving out…” Simply put, the workers were tired. They were hitting it
hard and needed some rest. The phrase “giving out” carries with it the idea of
“staggering, tottering, and stumbling.”

When you
are physically drained, it is very easy to become discouraged at the slightest
problem. It’s also interesting to notice when the workers became fatigued and
discouraged. Verse 6 says that the wall was built to half its height. Many
times when we start a new project the first half goes quickly because we’re
excited about accomplishing the goal.

But, when
the newness wears off and the work becomes routine and boring, then it’s easy
to become fatigued. And when you’re tired it’s easy to become discouraged and
to begin to think that you will never finish the job. Verse 10 says: “…we
cannot rebuild the wall.” They were ready to throw in the towel. These are the
same people who were described in verse 6 as those who worked with all their
heart.

If you’re
feeling fatigued today, watch out. Tiredness can lead to discouragement.
Remember what God did when Elijah was tired ­ he sent an angel to give him some
bread and something to drink and then told him to go back to sleep. You cannot
burn the candle at both ends on a long-term basis. Sometimes the most spiritual
thing to do is to go to bed.

2.The second is frustration.Verse 10
continues by saying that there is “so much rubble” that they cannot rebuild the
wall. They became discouraged because they were so aggravated with the
situation. I’m sure they were encountering old broken rocks, dirt and dried-out
mortar, and other debris that was underfoot. This junk was everywhere. And it
was frustrating.

Just as
they lost sight of their goal, so too we can lose sight of our goal when we
have too much garbage in our lives. Hebrews 12:1 challenges us to get rid of
anything that causes us to be frustrated in our pursuit of godliness: “…let us
throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let
us run with endurance the race marked out for us.”

I don’t
know what the rubble is in your life but it may be television, it might be a
possession you’re holding on to, or even an unhealthy relationship. Is there a
sin you’ve been playing around with too long? Do you have a drinking problem,
or are you involved in some other kind of entanglement that is tripping you up?
Something you’ve been doing in secret that you think no one else knows about?
As the writer to Hebrews says, “Throw it off so you don’t get tripped up.”

3. Another cause of discouragement is fear.The
enemies of the Lord’s work had struck fear in the hearts of God’s people and
they felt like giving up. Remember what they said in verse 10: “We
cannot rebuild the wall.”

Did you
notice in verse 12 who gets afraid the quickest? “Then the Jews who lived near
them came and told us ten times over ‘Wherever you turn, they will attack us.’”
Those most affected by fear are those who lived near pessimistic people. If you
want to limit the depressing thoughts that bring fear into your life, then it’s
best to not hang around with negative people. It’s like the old saying, “If
you’re going to soar with the eagles, you can’t run around with turkeys.”

Fear puts us in a frame of
mind where we cannot only become discouraged, we can also be deceived. I don’t
want to spoil the ending, but since most of you have already completed your
assignment to read the book of Nehemiah, I’m going to give it away ­ the enemies
never do attack Jerusalem! In the book, Scared to Life, Douglas Rumford cites a
study that shows why we shouldn’t let fear rule our lives

60% of our fears are totally
unfounded

20% are already behind us

10% are so petty they don’t make any
difference

5% are real, but we can’t do anything
about them

5% are real, and we can do something
about them

Don’t miss the concluding part of this message tomorrow; God Bless
you in Jesus Name.

Sermon by Brian
Bill

Prayer Points

1.Every weapon of discouragement working against my life be
cancelled now!!! in the name of Jesus.

2.Power of God, arise remove the
satanic cover on those who will bless me and connect me with
my divine helpers, in the name of Jesus.

3.Blood of Jesus, speak on my behalf in Jesus name.

4.I reject every spirit of doubt, fear and discouragement , in the
name of Jesus

5.Let the angels of the Living God roll away every stone of
hindrance to the manifestation of my breakthroughs, in the name of Jesus.

6.O Lord, hasten your word to perform miracles in every department
of my life.

7.The Lord who answer by fire and the God of Elijah, answer me by
fire, in the name of Jesus.

Confession Prayers

1.I will not worry about tomorrow, I will trust in my Heavenly
Provider to meet the needs for today. For when the enemy comes in like a flood,
the Spirit of the Lord will lift up a standard against him.

2.Thank you God for
protecting me and caring for all of my needs. I am well taken care of; through
Jesus Christ your benevolent Son our Lord.

3.Father, help me to
recognize that you have called me to be faithful not successful.

4.Help me to focus my
efforts in pleasing You alone, not people.

5.I will not take on more
responsibility than You intend for me and I will be careful to humble myself
through Jesus Christ.

6.Spirit of the Living God,
correct my thinking. Help me to be strong and courageous in my thought-life.

7.Let fear and doubt be far
from me. Instead fuel my thoughts with faith; in the name of Jesus Christ.